forgiven
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: (anime) In the middle of the night, Edward takes a walk only to be faced with something that he wasn't quite sure he could deal with at the moment.


**Fandom: Full Metal Alchemist  
Title: forgiven.  
Pairing: Edward + Roy  
Rating: PG  
Description: (anime) In the middle of the night, Edward takes a walk only to be faced with something that he wasn****'****t quite sure he could deal with at the moment****.**

**Disclaimer: Full Metal Alchemist belongs to my favorite company, Square Enix! ^_^ So, obviously, it isn****'****t mine. And ****"****Ready Steady Go****"**** is by my favorite j-rock band, L****'****arc En Ciel!  
**_  
/__"__Ready Steady Can__'__t hold me back  
Ready Steady Give me good luck  
Ready Steady Never look back  
Let__'__s get started  
Ready Steady Go!__"__/_

**forgiven.  
By miyamoto yui  
**  
In the middle of the night, the vampire-eyed boy left his room while pulling his red coat along with him.  
His white gloves slowly closed the door behind him as he crept through the creaky inn while trying his best not to disturb anyone else at such an hour.

When he was finally out of the inn, he let out a relieved sigh. His brother, like most siblings with special bonds, might have noticed that he left. He didn't want him to worry, but nor could he fall asleep.

He opened and closed his hands. Open, close, open, close…this continuous action built a tension within his mind as, ironically, his fingers became more and more relaxed.

The boy stared as his hands and then went off to walk to the darkest and quietest part of town. As he passed by the wooden buildings with the engraved markings of being used for so many years, he couldn't help but smile to himself. Despite everything, there were still people who could live "normally".  
And now, those people were dwelling in slumber with the lullaby of the wind blowing and the stars that probably held individual wishes, or maybe several. He looked up to the sky and continued to walk with this thought in mind, "I wonder if I told him this, would he look at me like I'm crazy? Well, it's not like he hasn't already."

But then, his stomach began to feel uneasy. It was that type of stomachache that pounded with the fists of guilt as it tried to push itself through the walls. In the back of his mind, he couldn't rest. No matter how much he had tried to push the thought away, he thought if his brother somehow resented him. For no matter how much someone told you out of kindness that things were "all right", it was only human nature to doubt. Not necessarily to doubt the person whom you spoke with, but yourself. A reflection of your own insecurities.

When he looked up from watching the dust rise and fall on the dirt road, he gasped a bit and immediately stopped walking. Talking out of turn, his head slightly adjusted itself to the height of its listener. In slight irritation, he asked, "What are you doing here?"

Then, he swished his head from his left side and then to his right. There was no vehicle, no other people around them, no evidence that showed that the person in front of him couldn't have just magically appeared before him.  
"Obviously, I came to see you," the man in his dust covered, blue uniform answered with a nonchalant tone that gave nothing but vibes of detachment. If that was really true, why was he there then?  
Without knowing it, the boy took a piece of his red coat in between his white fingers. Looking away, his obvious bout of consternation was in full swing as he commented, "Couldn't you have waited until I reported in tomorrow?"

He could never understand what the hell was going up with this particular superior.

"How about if I said that I wanted to hear it directly from you instead of stacks of papers?" The man continued to stare at him, unable to do anything yet wanting something to happen. Anything. Holding back and yet wanting to give, what an irony between two alchemists, wouldn't you have thought?

With a smirk on his face, he added, "And I know how much you hate to write, especially the details."

The boy's braid swung as his head quickly turned around to glare at him. It was a reflex type of thing. He couldn't understand why he always acted this defiantly whenever it concerned this person.

"The stacks of papers could have said the same message, _Colonel_." There was a special emphasis on that last word as it left a bad aftertaste on his tongue.

The smirk was gone as the Colonel let out an exasperated sigh. "And then you leave immediately without another word. And it isn't even to my desk anymore."  
"It's not like I'm there especially to see you." With a wave of his hand, the short boy turned to his right and walked towards the large running river.

Watching him with his white, pyrotex gloves becoming fists, he clenched his teeth as his eyes closed in annoyance. Actually, he was secretly hurt by this turn of events. If he could last through Ishbal, then his iron will could have done anything. Just because you were broken inside didn't mean that you had to put your life on hold to pull yourself together. No, there wasn't ever enough time for that. You had to just persist, hoping that the fragments you picked up in this RPG-ish type of living were the things you needed to survive.  
But why was that vampire-eyed boy slowly taking his life away without knowing? Why was he so affected by a boy who was only how tall and almost half his age no less?

The full metal alchemist wanted to run away. If there was any dignity left between them, he wanted to just pick up the pace and totally run in the opposite direction. It wasn't that he didn't know what he was  
up against or that he wasn't going to fight for it, but this was overbearing. He already had enough to deal with, and the Colonel wasn't helping him. He always added more into the pile of troubles and mysteries that were trying to be solved with each step he took towards finding that seemingly nonexistent "truth".  
But he found himself at the side of a river, at the edge of land and water. He looked down at the rushing river before him. Wasn't there anywhere else to go?

He glanced at the inn and the window that led to his brother's and his room. Then, he looked down at the river again, wondering what the full meaning of trust meant to anyone these days.

But at the soft crunching of the grass under the Colonel's feet, the boy knew he would have to deal with this problem today. At this very moment. Whether or not he liked it.

"What sin do you want revoked?" The golden-eyed boy asked as he turned around with his hands on his sides. He was trying to make a joke of everything, hoping that his mask wouldn't fail him until the Colonel left him.

Revoked. Shouldn't it have been "forgiven"? But who could have forgiven any of them for the things they had done?

"Now, you're making yourself god, Edward?" The Colonel was highly amused. He crossed his arms as he smirked at him once more. The boy never failed to surprise him, even at the worst of times.  
"You're the one who put me here." Edward, with the defiant eyes softening just a bit, looked at him like the fifteen-year-old boy he should have been. The rebelliousness mixed with melancholic confusion stared out through those golden eyes of his.

The man was taken aback. He was really caught off-guard.  
And through his head, a flash of the boy who tried to kill him in Ishbal as he held his index finger and thumb ready to ignite anything, was pushing down on his whole body. His cool façade and his grip on his life was fading just for a brief moment.

"What am I supposed to do?" the boy asked him as he took a step towards him.

Everywhere he went, he was looking for answers. And no matter how many answers came, even more questions would present themselves. Then, he would be lost all over again. If he didn't push everything away for moments at a time, then he wouldn't have been able to keep his sanity or his firm grasp on his goals within his own life.  
But why did the Colonel always have to look at him as if he knew the weakness that he tried to conceal from everyone, especially his little brother Al?

He wanted to fall to his knees and grab onto the dirt to soil his gloves. He wanted to shout and to cry out all the things he couldn't put into words. But he wouldn't allow himself to.

Both of them were too prideful to fall apart in front of the person they admired the most.

"I just want to be forgiven." With a solemn face, the Colonel, who had always calculated everything to the last detail, looked older than his twenty-nine-year-old face. Without knowing, he reached out to Edward and hugged him. He hugged him as tightly as he could while trying his best not to cry.

Maybe it was wrong to ask for such a thing. Maybe it was a mistake to ask to atone for everything that he couldn't take back. But not this person. He didn't want this person, most of all, to hate him for doing what he had to do.

And Edward stood there with nothing to say. For the first time in his life, his quick mind left him speechless and no witty remark to retort back at the one person who made him more cautious than he already was. Those eyes of his always knew everything, or so he thought.

"I can't do that-" the boy was trying to say, but the Colonel interrupted by saying, "I wanted you to learn as much as you could. I knew you would eventually see the atrocities that only alchemists could see.  
"But most of all, I wanted to protect you from yourself. Yes, we do become stronger with everything we experience, but there is something that equivalent trade can't ever account for."

The boy continued to stand there frozen and unable to push or pull the Colonel, whose touch was making him feel so warm and yet so uncomfortable at the same time. He kept his eyes closed because he didn't know what to look at. His face? His uniform? The river? The trees? The moon?

He found himself saying, "Don't tell me. I have to find out for myself."

And it was then that Colonel let him go. Strangely, Edward took off both of his gloves and dropped them to the floor of green. Roy stepped back, regaining his smooth resolve as he did so.

But the unpredictability of the boy before him could never be contained to any of his mental equations.  
Edward pulled grabbed his collar and his golden eyes looked straight into the Colonel's. He shook his head, not believing what he was about to do.

"Do you really believe I have the authority to forgive you?"  
"Yes."  
"Then…" Edward said as he let go of the Colonel's collar and slid his hands up his neck.  
"…you…" The metal hand and the hand of flesh made their way up to the flustered face of the Colonel.  
"…are, Roy." The boy finally said as he pulled the man's face towards him as the man leaned a bit forward to catch his own form of redemption.

After Edward kissed him and let go, the Colonel couldn't help but smirk while trying to avoid the gaze of those vampire eyes. The ones where the seconds of his life were being counted and drained.

"What are we going to do about this?" Edward asked as he faced the river once more while trying not to show his embarrassment.

"We'll deal with the details later," Roy answered as he shook his head with a smile. It was the first true smile he gave in years.  
And Edward caught a glimpse of it.

As Roy was about to go, he cleared his throat. He laughed as he said, "How am I going to do anything with you if you don't grow any taller?"  
Edward's temper rose as he shouted while turning around with a red face, "I will! Just you watch!"  
Roy winked at him. "I'll be looking forward to it."

Then, the Colonel left with his laughter ringing through the air as Edward looked at his back in silence.

"You give me too much credit," he quietly said to himself.  
The man turned around and smiled at him again. "No, I just trust you the most."  
"Hey," Edward called out to him, almost not wanting him to leave yet.  
"Yes?"

Even though he knew it was silly, he asked his question anyway. "Do you think the stars hold individual wishes or several at a time?"  
"Umm…" The Colonel was stumped. He never thought of life in such a way before. His eyes looked down and then up to the sky. They landed on Edward's handsome face and his smile became a bit wider.

Snap.  
Roy snapped his fingers and a small fire formed just above his two fingers. He looked at it and then at Edward, still with the fire burning between them.  
"Since when did you become a dreamer?"  
"You're always like this! Why can't you answer me-"  
"I _am_ answering your question. I asked you to play god not because you're an alchemist. Sure, you have the abilities, but there's something in you that I can't find in anyone else."  
"And what is that?"  
"You're too humble, Edward. Don't you know that I already know that you're one of those that were fallen?"  
"Fallen?"  
"A star." The Colonel laughed as he found himself acting like a little kid.

Edward just blinked at him, wondering when and how the Colonel had ever thought of him in such a way.

The man extinguished the flame and turned around. "That's why I made sure to keep you close to me."  
Without another word, the Colonel left.

As the Colonel walked towards the driver that was waiting for him, Edward was heading back towards his room. A new burden had formed with the power of knowledge. The power of emotions had helped with the thoroughness of its weight.

Both of them silently thought in fear and in anticipation of a new challenge, "What is the price we will pay for this?"

Yes, it was true that alchemists had a very scientific point of view on life itself. And yes, it was true that they experienced things that other people couldn't ever imagine in order to get to where they were today.

But they knew something that other people didn't know about living. These two particular alchemists knew.

You had to fight your way to the top with all of your mind in order to be forgiven. You had to wish with all of your blood in order for a miracle to happen. You had to fall with all your heart to be saved.  
**  
+/+/+/+/+/**

Edward's eyes stared up at the ceiling and then he turned his head towards the window. Whispering to himself, he questioned, "Why do you have to make things so complicated, Colonel? And…  
Why do you need me? What can I offer you? I don't understand you at all…"

As Roy went to sleep that night, he thought to himself, "After Ishbal, I didn't believe in anything. But you made me believe in people and humanity again. And after all this destruction, can I be selfish to want a miracle?  
Without looking back, I don't care about what I have to sacrifice now.

What must I present as equivalent trade to have you?"

**Owari. / The End.**

**Author****'****s note:** I really, really love this anime and I love this pairing. I don't know where the hell this came from, but here it is. ^_^ I wanted to show the tension in their relationship as well as their difference in experiences.

**Tuesday, June 08, 2004**


End file.
